Careless Mother in the Lake
by myloveimfaithfullyyours
Summary: “'...Oh my darling, oh my darling, oh my darling Clementine…' The woman continued to sing, her voice dimming as I was carried further and further away by a vigorous current." Rated T for Language. Please Review! Will have, Booth/Bones, Castle/Beckett
1. Prologue

a/n: First crossover, I'd appreciate it if you were nice, but feedback is always good. The rest of the chapters will be written in third person, I just thought it'd be easier if I wrote this one in first person. Anyways, hope you like it! Enjoy!

…and please, REVIEW!

* * *

Careless

Mother in the Lake

**Victims POV**

They say that when you're dying, your life flashes before your eyes. Those were my last thoughts before falling asleep.

* * *

There was a sound that woke me from my sleep. A voice, there was no doubt it belonged to a male. He was singing, but the sound was distant. I glanced at the clock. 2:33 AM.

"_Frère Jacques, Frère Jacques…" _The voice sang, deeper than before.

"_Dormez-vous, dormez vous…?"_ A familiar female voice joined in, laughing lightly as she inhaled to begin the next line, or so I thought she would. Instead she stopped, and began the first verse all over again. "_Frère Jacques, Frère Jacques…" _

On cue, the male voice took over again, and he repeated the first verse until I had to strain my ears to hear barely a whisper. I heard the door shut, in the middle of the second '_dormez-vous'_ I got up, throwing back the covers and quietly tip-toeing over to the door. I had every intention of following him, though I knew I should probably call the police.

He stopped at the top of the stairs, a blue hood covering his head. He was tall, about 6 foot 4. He stood next to a woman who was just slightly shorter than him. "La voiture est devant l'hôtel?" 'Is the car in front of the hotel?' He asked in a gruff voice.

The woman shook her head, her rack of mocha curls shaking violently. "Non." She replied, "Il n'y est pas là. Il est en face du restaurant." No. It's not there, it's in front of the restaurant.

"Zut. Nous sommes en retard. Allons. Je conduirai." Late. He said he was late, but for what? I followed them at a reasonable distance as they swiftly walked through alleyways towards a glowing neon sign that read '_The Sushi King_.'

The streets were empty. Not a single car whizzed by at this hour. Shops were closed and people had deserted the streets long ago. The glow of the of traffic lights were the main source of brightness at the moment.

"Dépecher-toi!" He said, and her pace quickened. We reached the small hidden parking lot behind the Japanese restaurant. It was a _very_ nice car. The shiny black paint gleamed in the dim light. I coughed. Fuck. I squeezed my eyes shut, and pressed my back against the wall even more, hoping that neither of them had heard me.

* * *

Silence took over the parking lot. I held my breath and waited for the moment to pass before I built up the courage to breathe again, but nothing happened. I didn't dare move, or they might hear me. Suddenly, the silence was broken by a wail.

A baby.

I stole a glance back to my apartment just one block down and panicked. I left the baby in the crib. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

"_In a cavern, in a canyon, excavating for a mine…lived a miner forty-niner and his daughter Clementine…"_ The man sang again, his voice calming the screaming baby. I needed to move. To save her life, but I couldn't. My feet felt like they were glued to the floor, my arms felt like they were permanently pinned against the wall. I felt like a shadow that couldn't move unless it's owner decided to do so.

"_Oh my darling, Oh my darling, Oh my darling Clementine…" _The woman continued and handed a bundle to the hooded male. He slipped the baby into the car, and slammed the door shut. I closed my eyes tightly and waited for my muscles to respond, but they never did.

I opened my eyes and the woman was gone from her place beside the man. He now stood alone, hovering over the driver's seat looking off into the distance. Where was she? I thought to myself, I could feel my pulse increasing rapidly.

Then I heard it. The soft familiar feminine voice was slowly getting closer to me, "_You are lost and gone forever," _She paused, my feet were still glued to the floor and I felt an awful pain in my head before I felt my body touch the cool concrete ground.

* * *

I closed my eyes for a moment, and when I opened them, I couldn't see, there was something in my field of vision. I could feel the friction coming from the ground below me and I wincedfeeling the gravel pierce my skin. When my senses recovered a little, I could hear the voice again, _"…lost and gone forever, dreadful sorry Clementine…"_ She sang, and everything went black.

I awoke again, sometime later. It was a baby's cry that startled me from my sleep. I tried to sit up, to see what they had done to the infant, but I only hit my head on a low ceiling. Where the fuck was I? Where was the baby?

I wanted to scream, but there was duct tape over my mouth. I blinked several times and observed that I was no longer wearing a blindfold, I just now noticed because even with my eyes open the darkness was just the same.

It felt like days before light finally flooded into the cramped space. I squinted, the brightness hurting my eyes and my head a great deal. I recognized a waterfall of brunette curls pour into the area the light was in.

"Where-sh the bab-ee!?" I attempted to yell through the layer of tape. The woman laughed, or rather cackled. "Let me go!" I mumbled again. The woman only cackled louder, throwing back her hair for effect.

The man approached and peaked into the space as well and met my eyes. Chuckling, he lifted me out of the confined space, and shoved me to the floor. I tried to turn my head to see my surroundings, but a sharp pain from the tip of a pair of heels.

"Si à ta place, je ne parlerais pas!" If I were you, I wouldn't speak, she said and kicked again.

"Arrêt-toi!" Stop. The man said sternly, putting his hand up in front of the woman's face.

"Where-sh the bab-ee!?" I tried again unsuccessfully.

"La bebe? Tu veux savoir au sujet de l'infant?" The baby? You want to know about the baby? The woman sweetly took out a bundle from the car and rocked it back and fourth taunting it in my face.

"Say goodbye." The male grabbed my tied hands from behind my back, and mimicked a wave.

"No! No! No!" I shouted, but it was too late for anything. The baby started to cry, his tiny little fists punching the air. He never knew his father, and he would never know his mother.

"Shhh, shh…" She shushed the baby and began to sing again. _"Ruby red lips, above the water, blowing bubbles soft and fine…"_

As she sang, I was blindfolded again, and dragged by something against what felt like old splintered wood. I could feel my body being lifted again, and placed into a container of some sort as the chorus of the song began to fade with distance.

That's when the sound of seagulls took over my senses, seagulls, and water was crashing onto the shore and against rocks. The sound that used to sooth me to sleep was now my biggest fear.

"…_though in life I used to hug her, now she's dead, I'll draw the line…"_ Her sweet voice drew closer as did the sound of her footsteps, and the baby boy laughed with joy as she sang.

I grimaced as I felt my legs being grabbed together forcefully. I was once again being hauled into the air, however this time by my legs and I was being spun like how a father spins a toddler in around by just holding her hands. I was getting dizzy, despite the fact that I couldn't see.

The man let go, and splash, my body felt numb. I struggled to stay above the surface, but I knew it was no use. The salt water seeped into the blindfold, sticking it to my face and causing my eyes to sting severely. I could hear the baby crying again, and the woman began to sing the chorus to quiet him.

"_...Oh my darling, oh my darling, oh my darling Clementine…"_ The woman continued to sing, her voice dimming as I was carried further and further away by a vigorous current. The waves began to swallow me in, and in the spur of a moment everything became clear. I knew her voice, once.

"…_Now you're lost and gone forever," _maybe I should've have called her and apologized. Maybe I should've done it yesterday, but really I should've done it years ago. "_Dreadful sorry Clementine…" _She finished, and I could no longer hear her voice.

I was completely submerged in the water now. I closed my eyes and prayed for the baby to be okay, I prayed and I prayed and I prayed.

I was too lost in my thoughts of how idiotic I was to notice everything slowly fade to black, but I remember thinking before falling asleep again, 'your life really does flash before your eyes.'

**

* * *

**

Kate Beckett, POV.

"Castle, we have a case, I'll swing by to pick you up." With that, I hung up the phone and grabbed an apple from the counter and jogged straight out the door. The phone rang, and I grabbed for it as I stuck the key of my car into the ignition.

"What, Castle?" I asked impatiently, maneuvering myself out of the parking space and into the streets.

"I just wanted to let you know, I'm out of contact lenses, and I'll get them tomorrow."

"So? Couldn't this have waited?"

"I just wanted to let you know my vision is impaired." Damnit, I slammed on the breaks.

"Fine, while we're having sharing time," I added sarcastically, "I want to let you know that the Feds will be on this one too." I informed him, and hung up. "Too bad it wasn't his vocals." I mumbled under my breath before slipping the device into my pocket.

**

* * *

**

Agent Seeley Booth, POV.

"…so do you feel like this is going to affect your partnership?" Dr. Sweets was counseling us when I felt my cell phone vibrate in my pocket.

"Booth." I answered.

"Agent Booth…" Sweets trailed off. Bones looked at me eagerly, mouth watering almost.

"Agent Booth," The voice came from the other line. "We have a case. Bodies been pulled out of a body of water down by East River Park, Manhattan. Somehow it's already been established as FBI jurisdiction. " I motioned for Bones to get up just he finished off his sentence.

"We'll be there as soon as possible."

"NYPD's already there, sir."

"Tell them _not _to touch anything, you know for a fact that my partner likes to see things before they're moved around."

"Yes sir, but I warn you NYPD's going to want to be in on this one."

"Fine. Whatever."

"Okay, and just to let you know, put your charm on, the lady Detective here is not particularly fond with the Feds. Oh, and tell your partner to put on her best charm too, because she's got a writer monkey tagging around." The click meant that he had hung up and I turned to Bones.

"We've got a case. Great seeing you Sweets!" I said, while waving with one hand and dragging Bones out by the other.

"…but we weren't…finished," Sweets shouted but waved back as he shouted sarcastically, "…fine, you're dismissed, always great seeing you guys!"


	2. Crime Scenes and Sushi Dinners

a/n: Alrighty, aside from the crime scene, I spent a majority of this chapter developing the relationship the four may have. it's kind of childish, but just a little. Don't say I didn't warn you. I did my best to keep all four of them in character. Reviews are GREATLY appreciated. There's a surprise from the lab the next chapter, which is mostly focussed on the development of the case. Locations are pretty accurate. I tried my best. Thanks so much, for reading, and even more thanks for reviewing, and without any more of my blabbering and excuses = D I present to you, chapter 2.

One last reminder! Please Review!

Chapter Two: Crime Scenes and Sushi Dinners

The big, blue SUV with tinted windows buzzed through the empty narrow streets on the way to East River Park, Manhattan. The aroma of sea salt clung to the air outside. It was very quiet, despite the fact that it was only early evening, most the small shops and cafes had closed, leaving waiters standing by the door solving crossword puzzles and swatting flies.

"Doesn't look like a typical place for people to get killed." Bones observed as they whizzed by small shops and art galleries.

"Yeah, we're going to a park, Bones, how big do you think the population is in a state park?"

"Yes. True, but still."

"Bones, it's still New York." Booth replied blankly.

"Do they have the whole body?"

"Kind of. They need you because they're missing body parts, such as the skull."

"It's difficult to identify the remains without a skull, you know. I can give you approximate age and gender, but it'll be difficult to give you much more, and besides cause of death…" She was cut off by Booth pulling into a small parking lot, and the sound of the engine turning off.

"Where are we staying?" She asked, switching subjects.

"At Best Western; not too far from the park." He said, and pushed his door open to be greeted by a swarm of police who were mostly shooing away nosy civilians.

"Agent Booth." A male who was several inches shorter than Booth approached him, and Booth flashed his badge just to confirm his identity. The man began to lead them to the crime scene under the yellow caution tape.

It was relatively warm out today, considering it was early August after all. The water was a shade of blue-ish grey glittering lightly in the sun. The smell of wet sand took over the entire harbor, wet sand, and the familiar scent of a decomposing, or already decomposed body.

"Augh, I'll never get used to that smell," Booth said, fanning his hand in front of his face dramatically.

"Honestly, neither will I," Bones commented, and proceeded to point to a pair coming around the corner of the crime scene.

"Agent Booth?" The female greeted, tilting her head to the side a bit to get a better view of Booth who was just inches taller than her. She ran her hand through her neat reddish-brown hair before putting it out for Booth to shake.

"Detective Kate Beckett, NYPD, and this here's my," she paused thinking about what to introduce Castle as; "this is my _consultant_, Richard Castle." Castle stuck his right hand out too for Bones and Booth to shake.

"I'm Special Agent Seeley Booth, and this is my partner Dr. Temperance Brennan of the Jeffersonian Institute." Bones offered a small smile, and Booth gave his best charm smile.

He looked at Beckett and said, "We have to come up with something like that. It sounds so…'_Bond, James Bond'." _He paused and watched Beckett roll her eyes before turning to Dr. Brennan "I'm sorry, but I can't help but to ask, Temperance Brennan, as in the author?" Castle jumped in front of Kate to examine the scientist.

"Yes…but most of the time just a forensic anthropologist. I know you, too. Well, know of you, Richard Castle, the novelist, right?" She smirked and slid on a latex glove.

"The one and only," Castle grinned and walked towards the crime scene with Dr. Brennan.

"Bones! Wait up!" Booth shouted after her, and jogged up to her side. "What do we have, Detective?" He asked, motioning to the crime scene.

"Part of a body was discovered here today by a father and his son while trying to find a good spot to fish, it's pretty much complete, but the head," Kate was interrupted by Dr. Brennan kneeling down beside the crime scene and correcting her.

"Actually, Detective, it's the skull. It would most likely be decomposed by now, if we find it, we'll have it shipped back to the Jeffersonian so that our forensic artist can do a facial reconstruction. I'll also need a sample of the water, and the soil to ship back as well and whatever fragments of clothing your team can find." She finished, and began to poke around at the remains.

"Well, we have a coroner and everything, here." Detective Beckett argued.

"Yes, but we have to have the best." Bones clarified and stood up.

Beckett looked at Booth who simply shrugged and shouted, "Get what the doc wants back to the Jeffersonian for analysis!!"

"Wait! Don't move anything yet." Kate Beckett shouted, and huffed when she noticed no one was listening and turned to Booth and stated, "Agent Booth, please tell them not to move anything yet."

Agent Booth cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted, "Aye, guys! Listen to the lady Detective here! Don't move anything!" Immediately everyone halted, and returned to informing civilians that everything would be alright. "Bones, what do we have, here?" He asked, standing over the body.

"Female. Early to mid-twenties. Definitely given birth, and obviously no skull, and no skull means no positive cause of death. We can ship the whole thing back to the Jeffersonian as soon as Detective Beckett finishes giving her orders."

"Castle!" Booth shouted over to Rick who was staring down at the body from not too far away.

"Yeah, what's up?" He asked casually.

"Where's the Detective?" Booth asked looking around.

"Over by the docks," He pointed a finger towards where she was standing before continuing his thought. "This one looks good. Creepy, if you know what I mean…the way she's been like decapitated, it's really gruesome."

"Yeah," Agent Booth said. "It is, and you know what…It's creepy, but she's a human. So give her some respect, got it?" He said with authority before walking off to find Detective Beckett, but not before pausing and turning around the face the other man, "Castle, you look bored, go talk to my partner over there, she'll fill you in on the details if that's what you want."

* * *

Booth walked over to Detective Beckett who was just finishing up with Ryan and Esposito. "Detective, if the four of us are to work together, I think we should all communicate." He emphasized the word 'communicate' and smiled.

"Fine, if you insist, I'll give you a play by play," She said sheepishly.

"Right. Narrate your personal life to me too, don't forget that, well I guess you don't have to, if you decide not to cooperate, I'll just have agents tag around with you all day…as if the novelist isn't enough." He added.

She laughed lightly and pointed to Esposito and Ryan going in the opposite direction. "I was telling my team, Detectives Ryan and Esposito to do a perimeter walk, take a couple of pictures and gather any possible witnesses." She explained.

"Interesting. You should meet our team, too." He stated, and turned to see Bones waving over at him. Agent Booth turned back to Detective Beckett and nudged her, and told her to follow.

"So what's your deal with the FBI?" He asked, remembering the agent's words over the phone.

"My deal with them? Whatddya mean?" She looked confused.

"Well, see, over the phone," Booth felt a twinge of awkwardness wash over him. "Over the phone, the agent told me to 'put on my best charm' because you're not 'too fond with the Feds,' was how he said it."

She laughed. "My ex-boyfriend was an agent, and let's just say he's now an _ex_-boyfriend, so you can see how that ended up."

"I see, well it's clear a pretty Detective like you deserves better." He grinned.

"Is that your, charm…Agent Booth?" She smirked.

"Yeah, is it working?" He joked and looked over to where Bones and Castle were working, well where Bones was working and Castle was noisily chatting away. He met her eyes, and she quickly looked down.

"So are you and Dr. Brennan…" Kate trailed off, raising an eyebrow at him.

"Me and Bones. Bones and I…no, we're just partners, and friends, that's all."

"You're close?" She asked, as they neared where Dr. Brennan and Castle were chatting.

"Well, after being shot at by clowns and other things, blown up several times, kidnapped, buried alive, prepared to be blown up, we're pretty close. We're all really close actually, the whole team." He stopped behind Bones who was giving instructions to the FBI team to bag up some of the evidence.

"Are they here?" Beckett asked Booth.

"The team? Nah, most of them are back at the Jeffersonian, but I guarantee that you'll meet them on this trip."

"Beckett!" Esposito's voice broke up their conversation.

"Did you find something?" She asked, as she turned away and walked towards the place being marked off by police.

* * *

Back at the body, Dr. Brennan filled Castle in on what she'd discovered.

"You're job's pretty cool." He commented.

"You mean elbow deep in decomposing corpses? Actually…this is relatively clean. Sometimes we get chili con carne for our bodies…or ones that've been shoved through wood chippers."

"Seriously?" Castle asked, his eyes popping.

"Yeah. So are you and Detective Beckett…dating?" She asked, catching herself before she said 'intimate,' it was hard to steer clear of interrogation room questions after awhile of getting used to them.

"Beckett and I? Not in a million years." He said, sighing.

"Really? Does she keep pushing you away?" Bones asked, trying to make conversation while digging through a corpse's remaining guts and scooping them into an evidence baggie.

"Yeah…well, I kind of stopped trying, but you know, I recently pried into her private life, when she told me not to, so there's still some tension between us."

"My friend, Angela would love to see you two work together." She said.

"Why is that?" Castle asked.

"Well, more like she would push for you two to get together, because she's just that kind of person."

"Bones!" Dr. Brennan lifted her head up from her work and looked over to Agent Booth and Detective Beckett. "We found the skull!" He said, and waved for her to come over.

"Ready to see what's left of a severed head?" Dr. Brennan asked, and began trudging up the small sandy hill.

"Ready as ever." Castle said, and marched right behind her.

* * *

The head or the skull was resting behind a massive rock in the water. The dark orbitals stared straight into nowhere, and Castle couldn't help squirm knowing that this was once a person.

"We won't be able to get identification from dentals." Dr. Brennan confirmed immediately.

"Listen, Bones," He walked over and swapped places with Richard so that he was standing next to her. "Detective Beckett and I decided that we'd communicate, so basically every decision made has to go through every one of us…"

"Except for maybe, Castle, I'll speak for him." Beckett smiled, and earned a teasing punch from the man himself.

"Turning into Cam, Booth?" Bones teased, but cooperated anyway.

"I'll be sending the skull back to the Jeffersonian to my best friend Angela, she's also the sketch artist, and she'll be able to recreate a face after my assistant places tissue markers on it."

"Geez, how many people are in your team anyway?" Castle asked.

"Quite a few, in fact, it'd be a good time to meet some of them now." Booth herded the bunch over to his car where his laptop was.

* * *

"Wow. This is the ultimate FBI car. Just like all the Feds do it. You guys are like straight out of a crime show, I swear." Castle said running his eyes over the glimmering exterior of the vehicle.

"Before we proceed to meet them," Booth began to warn. "They're all…quite different, and geniuses. Well, except for Angela, she's a under-cover squint." The screen popped up and Mr. Nigel-Murray was there waving.

"Hello, Mr. Nigel-Murray," Dr. Brennan smiled, and began.

"Hi. I'm Dr. Brennan's grad-student for those of you who don't already know me."

Brennan began her instructions, "I wanted to let you know, we're having a skull shipped to you guys as we speak, I want you to put tissue markers on, and give it to Angela, to i.d. Tell Cam that I want a full autopsy done, you'll be receiving the body shortly, also. I should warn you, however that it's separate from the skull."

"Great." He said, and spun off the stool to get to work. Hodgins came up the camera next.

"Hey Dr. B, Agent Booth."

"Hodgins, if you haven't already heard, we're shipping samples of the water, and dirt over."

"It's not dirt." Hodgins insisted and glared.

"Sediment then." Brennan corrected herself. "Get Angela, please."

"Hey sweetie!" Angela's high pitched voice made Brennan feel at home again. "…sweetie, and hunky-FBI agent, and …well hello, who are you?" She looked over in Castle's direction.

"Me or her," Castle joked pointing to Detective Beckett. "I'm Richard Castle…" Castle smirked into the camera and waved happily. Angela smiled back, but was brought back to reality when Brennan started babbling about a facial reconstruction.

"Yeah, Bren, I'll get it done. So, Mr. Castle, aren't you a writer, what are you doing at a crime scene?" She asked suggestively.

"I'm assisting with this case…are you one of the geniuses?" He asked, causing Beckett to roll her eyes for the third time since the day began.

"Only undercover." She replied.

"Ange, please concentrate. Get us an i.d as soon as you can, and try to also give us whatever digital rendering you can. Thanks. I'll talk to you later."

"Fine," she replied frustrated. "Love you guys." She hung up and the screen went blank.

* * *

"Digital rendering?" Kate asked.

"We reconstruct three dimensional figures predicting how the victim was killed." Dr. Brennan sounded proud as she explained how the latest technology could be used to solve cases.

"So you identify remains from nothing?" Castle jumped in.

"Not from nothing. The skeletal structure is the most important part of your body, without it, you'd be Jell-O and none of your organs would function." She responded defensively.

"Let's say we go out to dinner while all this gets cleaned up, aye?" Booth suggested, hoping that someone would quit provoking the argument.

"You know, they call my writing pulp fiction." Dr. Brennan said, ignoring Booth entirely.

"I'm in for dinner, Agent Booth." Beckett agreed, stepping over a small rock on the ground and turned to face Castle and Brennan who were getting into some sort of argument.

"Is that so, Doctor?" Castle asked, crossing his arms across his chest.

"Yes, clearly, they don't know what they're talking about. Plus, they haven't read your writing." Brennan mimicked Castle's actions, and crossed her arms across her chest as well and glared up at him. Well, at least it looked like she glared, but it was hard to tell because the sun was shining directly in her eyes.

Castle opened his mouth to speak, but nothing came out. "Are you calling my writing pulp?" He finally tried, his lip slightly pouting.

"Precisely." Dr. Brennan confirmed and proceeded to explain why. Beckett stifled a laugh and Booth went in to save the poor author.

"Bones, dinner?" He asked, hoping to diverge her attention.

"What? Yeah, sure." She replied, and walked off to join Booth's side.

"What about you Castle, you in?" Booth asked, and looped one arm around Bones' middle, and the other around Detective Beckett's.

"Huh, oh sure." Castle replied slightly distracted and sulking-ly tagged along behind the trio.

* * *

The restaurant was relatively deserted, partially because by the time they had managed to answer all the questions from the press and drive down there, it was already about nine at night. The four of them were surprised that the restaurant was still open, and let out an in sync sigh of relief knowing that they wouldn't have to settle for McDonalds that night.

The neon sign reading 'open' flickered wildly outside. They had parked the SUV in a narrow spot by the window so that they could keep an eye on it at all times.

"…so do you think she drowned?" Detective Beckett began the conversation as soon as the waiter had handed them their menus and left.

"I don't like jumping to conclusions, but it's certainly possible, yes." Dr. Brennan replied in her usual tone of voice.

"Is it possible that it was just an accident?" Castle asked, scanning the menu briefly.

"Most likely not. My team will look for any signs of fowl play. Usually, I would be the one to look, but I feel it would be inconvenient traveling back and forth."

"Did you identify the container that was by the body?" Beckett looked at Booth, but Brennan answered anyway.

"No, we haven't. I believe it's made up of aluminum, but we'll hear back from my lab tomorrow morning at the latest."

"So, Agent Booth tells me that you've been through a lot together, meaning like being shot at by evil clowns." Kate raised her eyebrow and Castle's interest was suddenly sparked to life.

"It wasn't really a killer clown, it was a murderer dressed up like a clown." Bones clarified for the table.

"It was a killer clown," Booth countered, biting his lower lip.

"No, it was not. Clowns are classified as entertainers; they were comic performers who dressed up for the simple purpose of entertainment." Argued Brennan.

"Fine, whatever. Well, the murderer dressed as clown would literally scare his victims to death. Find out their worst fears, you know, spiders, small spaces –-"

"Clowns." Brennan presented Booth with a crooked grin.

"What? Why do clowns keep appearing in the conversation?"

"You're afraid of clowns." Brennan restated.

"Am not." Booth let out a low snicker.

"Are too. You're clearly coulrophobic."

"Wait, what phobic?" Castle asked before taking a sip of the water the waiter had set down several minutes ago.

"_Coulroph_o_bic._ It's the fear of clowns."

"You're 'fraid of clowns?" Beckett teased Booth from across the table.

"No. Well, they're just disturbing, and getting shot at by one doesn't help the situation."

"As I recall you shot one too!" Bones said with a wide smile.

"You shot a clown? At what, the circus?" Beckett looked amused.

"Don't _even_ bring up the word circus. It wasn't a real clown! It was loud and obnoxious…"

"And on top of an ice cream truck." Bones tilted her head and gave Booth 'the look.' Their gaze broke when Castle coughed slightly to point out that the waiter was standing at their table staring at the four, wide-eyed.

"I don't shoot clowns." Booth defended.

"He doesn't." Bones concurred.

The waiter still stood motionless with a pen and pad in hand, he looked severely shocked, like everyone at the table he was serving had just grown a second or third head.

"We work for the law enforcement. Police, FBI agent, and forensic scientist. Oh, and novelist."

The waiter still stood there.

"We're not criminals." Beckett tried, but the man was still stoned.

"You should try closing your mouth it's not flattering." Bones looked up at the man. "Okay, or not."

"We're ready to order." Castle said, and the waiter snapped out of his trance, but still didn't speak. "I'll have a gyoza, and a tempura roll. We'd also like a California Roll for all of us, with real crab." He closed his menu and placed it gently down at the edge of the table.

"I'll have a spider roll, and an avocado roll." Brennan placed her order and placed her menu down as well.

"I'll have a steak."

"Booth, this a sushi restaurant." Brennan said.

"Steak-roll?"

"Booth!" Brennan scolded.

"Fine. Can I please get a teriyaki chicken roll, and sake to split with everyone." He sighed, admitting defeat. "Oh! I got it, can I get it with steak sauce?" Booth asked, his chocolate brown eyes pleading intensely. The waiter sighed, and finally looked at detective Beckett, the look permanently plastered to his face.

"I'll have a tempura udon." She said, and offered the poor guy a smile. He looked up from his writing and waited for her to continue like Booth had. She gave him a confused look and simply stated, 'that's all," with a hint of a question at the end.

* * *

"So the circus?" Kate Beckett pushed once the stunned waiter had left.

"What about it?" Brennan asked, stirring her water with the straw.

"Agent Booth implied that you've had an, or some interesting experiences at the circus." Castle said.

"Yes, well, I got to throw knives at Bones." Booth grinned, but didn't add any further details. "What about you two? How does a novelist get paired up with a detective anyway?" He asks.

"Castle here struck a deal with the mayor, and my boss. He gets to follow me like a lost puppy because I'm 'Richard Castle's' muse for his next series of best sellers." She says the ending very sarcastically, and bites down on this side of her cheek.

"Struck a deal?" Booth asked.

"Mayor's a fan. Doesn't think my writing is pulp." Castle claimed.

"I never said that they mayor thought your writing was pulp."

"No, but you implied that everyone just thought it was pulp, Dr. Brennan." Kate smiled, noticing that he wasn't being one hundred percent serious about being upset.

"Do you think his writing is pulp, Detective?" Brennan asked, looking for a second opinion. Kate Beckett nearly choked on her drink when Dr. Brennan dropped the question.

"Yeah, do you, Detective?" Castle smirked, earning a glare from Kate.

"I—I find them, in-interesting. I like how they always solve the case, it's satisfying. Um, so I guess I'm saying they're okay." Beckett stuttered.

"So you've read them all?" Castle asked.

"Just a few." Kate lied.

"Because that's not what I heard…" Castle grinned from ear to ear.

"Shut up, Castle."

"Man, you two bicker more than we did when we first partnered up." Booth smiled.

"Well, at least you didn't have to deal with an arrogant and egoistic man child who wants to know what kind of toothpaste you use to put in his next novel!" Kate scowled.

"Well, I don't know, hanging out with people who have IQ's as high as Einstein all day really makes you feel stupid." Booth eyed Brennan.

"Are you blaming me for being smart? I can hardly imagine how I'm the one to blame for that." Brennan responded.

"Hardly." Castle nodded, just for the sake of it.

"You can't take sides." Booth argued.

"Who says we're taking sides?" Brennan asked.

"Nobody!" Booth put his hands up in the air before bringing them down in front of his face.

"Booth, I want a gun!" Brennan changed the subject, but her face was as serious as it was when she was talking about something scientific. By this time, the waiter had returned with their food. He carefully set each dish down on the table in front of them and scrambled away quickly.

"I'm pretty sure we just scared the shit out of him." Beckett confirmed quietly.

"Poor guy…"

"You get a gun?" Castle directed his question at Beckett.

"No. Apparently, my license was _denied."_ Brennan gritted her teeth and looked at Booth.

"Why was her licensed denied, Agent Booth?" Beckett inquired, separating her two chopsticks and rubbing them together briefly.

"Because the last time I let her have my gun, she shot the guy."

"For a good reason?"

"Yes!" Brennan said, digging into her food.

"Semi!" Booth remarked, and began eating his sushi as well.

"Can I have a gun, Beckett?" Castle looked at Beckett pleadingly.

"That's not up to me, but I can tell you, you don't have my recommendation."

"Agent Booth, do you think I would qualify for a gun?" Castle redirected the question at Agent Booth.

"Hey, that's not fair! If a pulp novelist can have a gun, than so can the top forensic anthropologist in the United States, or possibly the world!" Brennan flung her left hand into the air and smacked Booth in the face.

"I never said he could! And watch the chopsticks, they could take someone's eye out." Booth rubbed the side of his face that came in contact with the wooden sticks. "From what I've heard, you are certainly, _not_ qualified for a gun, Mr. Castle." Booth declared, and grinned at Kate.

"I understand why he can't have a gun, but why can't I? I don't see a logical or rational explanation behind it." Brennan muttered.

"Because YOU SHOOT PEOPLE WITH IT!" Booth began to raise his voice in frustration.

"Shh, Agent Booth, you're going to send the waiter running for the middle of Russia!" Beckett warned.

"THAT'S THE PURPOSE OF IT!!" Brennan yelled, disregarding Kate's advice.

"You know what, I'm leaving. End of discussion, I refuse to continue this discussion any further!" Booth stood up and stomped out of the restaurant groaning.

"There is no ARGUMENT!!!! It's a civilized debate!" Brennan's voice escalated so that he could hear her, and she followed him out the door. Beckett and Castle looked at each other, and couldn't help but to break into identically sized grins, but they quickly faded when Beckett realized something.

"They're our ride. They're our ride. Forget our, they're MY ride!" Beckett got up and grabbed her coat, running out of the door.

"Wait!" Castle stumbled to pull some money out of his wallet, and bolted out the door right after them. Hearing all the racket, the waiter quietly peaked his head out of the kitchen to see what the commotion was. To his utter surprise, the four were gone, and a $100 dollar bill sat flapping under a clean plate.

Looking out the window, the waiter shook his head, and reached for the left over sake.

* * *

end note: I feel like I've mentioned it, but it wouldn't hurt to say...I love receiving reviews.


	3. When Squints Come Marching In

a/n: Chapter mainly focused on the case. Take notice, minor changes have been made. I'm so sorry about the late update; sometimes life just gets in the way, ya know?

Disclaimer: Don't own Bones, or Castle, or the English language or Microsoft Word.

Review reply, Cat: thanks. I'll change it. I appreciate it, I'm trying my best to be accurate, but I don't know New York all that well, my friend lived in the Sag Harbor area for a bit so, I figured it'd be easier to be more accurate. Thanks again for the review, and feel free to add comments any time!

To the readers IMPORTANT! This must be so boring to read. I mentioned I tried to keep this story accurate, a reviewer pointed some details out to me, so I just wanted to notify you all that the location of the body has been changed to East River Park, Lower East Manhattan. I'm not sure what precinct Beckett is at, but I tried to find bodies of water by the upper-east side because it seems they've gotten cases from there, some of the details will still be made up, and also a specific detail at the lab (don't wanna give it away) as you'll see that comes up in this chapter. That's it. Merci! Okay, no more notes!

--

The sun looked like a giant ball of yarn hanging from the mid-eastern part of the sky. The ball of orangish-yellow flame (or as the squints would scientifically classify as plasma) slowly made its way towards the middle of the sky. In other words, it was about 9:25 in the morning.

The squints stood outside of the Jeffersonian after recently being shooed from the forensic platform.

"I can't believe it." Angela muttered to herself as she crossed her arms across her chest. "They can't just do that!" She groaned.

"They just did." Hodgins kicked the ground with his shoe.

"Right, but I think she's implying that they're technically not supposed to." Mr. Nigel-Murray commented.

"Well, duh."

"This is preposterous!" Cam exclaimed stomping out the Jeffersonian furiously, ignoring the fact that if her blood was in a pot, it would be over flowing by now because no one bothered to turn the fire off.

"Did you talk to them?"

"Yes." Cam gritted her teeth.

"What'd they say?" Angela asked, walking next to her.

"Whatever hopes you had of getting back to work on this case in that building, well kiss them goodbye." Sweets had emerged from the building, his hands stuffed into his pant pockets. "This isn't based on psychology, I heard Cam talking." Sweets looked down as if he was ashamed of his childish actions.

"You eavesdropped on my conversation?"

"I was walking by!" Sweets defended himself unsuccessfully.

"Drop it. We can't perform autopsies on the front steps." Hodgins announced the obvious. "We have to call Dr. Brennan, Agent Booth, Detective Beckett and her consultant." He didn't bothering naming Castle.

"Call on the way to the airport!" A voice came from outside of the conversation. It belonged to a man who was just a little bit taller than Angela. His hair color was somewhere between light brown and dark blonde. He had crystal blue eyes and a square jaw, just like Booth did.

"And you are…" Cam began, forgetting her manners due to her mood at the current moment.

"Special Agent Will Sorenson. I was originally put on this case." He introduced himself.

"Dr. Camille Saroyan." Cam introduced herself as well.

"Vincent Nigel-Murray." The others followed suit.

"Dr. Jack Hodgins."

"Dr. Lance Sweets."

"Angela Montenegro." She flashed a smile at the agent, but remembering her situation, it quickly faded.

"Alright, squints and artist, here's the deal," Agent Sorenson began with authority.

"We're putting all of you on the next plane to New York."

"Sweet!" Sweets exclaimed happily.

"We will not be there for sight seeing, Dr. Sweets." Sorenson clarified with annoyance at the young doctor's excitement.

"All you Feds just dislike me. I feel there's something we can do about that." Sweets said trying to be professional, but failing miserably when Sorenson shot him a death glare.

"Listen. You have an hour to pack. I'll swing by to pick all of you up, with all your stuff. If you're not down within 5 minutes of the time I get to your doorstep or whatever," He said, eyeing Hodgins for no specific reason, "I will leave without you. Got it?" Not waiting for any verbal responses, he turned around, put his sunglasses on, and marched away.

--

At about 9:45 in the morning, all of the squints had frantically rushed back to their apartments and houses (or mansions) and began throwing their closets into suitcases and duffle bags.

At exactly 10:30, Will Sorenson was standing with his hands in his pant pockets in front of the apartment of Camille Saroyan. The building was relatively tall, and definitely new. The windows glistened and sparkled in the sun as if they had just been cleaned minutes ago. Agent Sorenson knocked on the door for the second time, growing impatient with each second. Patience was not his strong point.

"Dr. Saroyan." He said, frowning at the closed wooden door. "Dr. Saroyan!" He tried again louder, she really was trying his patience, and he still had four more to pick up.

"Quit banging on my door." Cam pushed past the agent and scowled, and slung a laptop bag across her shoulders, and hooked the strap of a bag of 'medical' equipment to her dark blue suitcase.

"'Banging' wouldn't be necessary if you didn't take forever to open the damn thing." Cam shot him a glare, and walked towards the elevators.

"Who are we getting next?" Cam asked, breaking the thick layer of silence that clung between them.

"Hodgins, Sweets and Vincent." He replied, and leads the way to the car.

--

Mr. Nigel-Murray was packed and ready when he saw Agent Sorenson's FBI car approach the long stone driveway up to Hodgins's mansion. Sweets sat on the steps next to the young intern, staring at nothing in particular. He observed as Will groaned and made his way up the doorsteps to the main doors. Sorenson put his fist up, ready to knock on the door when he stopped abruptly in mid air, wondering if he should just call the guy, besides; it could take months to find just one small man in this huge house.

Shaking the thoughts out of his head, the young agent settled with knocking.

"Yes?" A maid immediately answered the door. Her dark hair was swept back into a ponytail, and she was smiling sweetly at the frustrated agent.

"Is there a Dr. Jack Hodgins here?"

"Just one moment." She opened the door wider to let him in. Agent Sorenson took a moment to let his eyes take in his surroundings. The ceilings looked like something out of the 'great hall' in _Harry Potter_. Sorenson rolled his eyes at the thought that he just summarized his awe by comparing his observations with a book about dueling wizards and witches.

Snapping out his trance, the agent turned over to face the maid who was delivering a message through the intercom. A crooked smile took over his face, as he heard the sound of the maid's voice echo throughout the entire house. Seconds later, Hodgins appeared supplies for his work in one hand and a rolling black suitcase in the other.

"Where's Vincent?" Agent Sorenson asked as Hodgins basically descended down the stairs like a homecoming queen.

"He's out by the fountain."

"The fountain?"

"Adjacent to the tennis courts." Hodgins said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"Right."

When they reached the area circling the massive fountain up front, Vincent was already sitting their waiting for them. He sat with on top of his suitcase, his camera bag resting against his shin and a laptop across his thighs.

"It took you exactly 6.14 minutes more than necessary to get to me. In the time I have been able to turn on my computer, enter my password, _and_ create a file for the new case." He mused, and snapped his laptop shut.

"I didn't know how much it agitated you to just pick us up!" Sweets exclaimed.

"Yeah, whatever." Will was getting aggravated with these people, wondering how Agent Booth was able to _enjoy_ working with them on a weekly or even daily basis. "Let's just get to the car before I pass out due to overload of useless information." He mumbled and began making his way over the car.

Vincent trailed behind the agent and said 'as a matter of factly,' "It's not useless and it is highly improbable that you would pass out due to overload of the information that you called useless, but I just said, wasn't."

Agent Sorenson held his breath and opened the door on the driver's side. He jammed his key into the ignition and suppressed a loud groan.

"Did you know…that there are 293 ways to make change for a dollar? And did you also know…" Vincent Nigel-Murray began, just as the car began to speed down the road.

--

Angela's apartment was last.

It was the oldest of the ones he had seen today. The dark wood was nearly engulfed in vines that surrounded it, the green wrapping itself around every corner and framing every window.

"Nobody gets out of this car," Sorenson began with annoyance in his voice. "If any of you decide to take a walk, I will leave without you. What's one less squint anyway?" Sorenson said as he exited the SUV.

"That guy is meaner than Booth." Sweets pointed out, and leaned back against his seat.

"Do you think maybe, we could open the windows?" Mr. Nigel-Murray asked and fanned himself for effect.

"Sure," Cam said. "If you plan on staying in Washington D.C."

By the time Sorenson had made it up the stairs (the elevator was under construction) he was beginning to the think that he should hit the gym a little more often.

"Angela!" He knocked on the door, he felt bad for her because she was the last person he was picking up and his patience was just about drained out.

"Angela!" He shouted again.

"I'm coming, I'm coming." Her voice sounded from behind the heavy looking wooden door. As the door opened, Angela came tumbling out, her luggage flying out in the middle of the hallway and her curls all over the place. Attempting to stop her fall, she stuck her hands out in front of her face; instead she shoved Agent Sorenson in the chest and landed on top of him.

"Sorry." She mumbled and casually pushed herself to her feet as if she fell on ever person who opened the door. Perhaps he should open her door more often…

"No big deal happens every day." Sorenson said sarcastically and brushed his FBI standard issue suit off. Angela rolled her eyes.

"Did you get everyone else?" She inquired, trying to balance everything on her shoulders and failing miserably.

Agent Sorenson didn't hear her question nor did he offered the artist any help, for his thoughts were preoccupied; he was busy worrying about one of the squints skittering off out of the SUV and him having to stand his ground. He wasn't afraid to just drive away, but he was informed by Agent Perotta at the office that Dr. Brennan would not solve this case as efficiently unless all her team was present, and Agent Sorenson knew that this was one case where things would have to be done as fast as possible.

"They wouldn't just get up and leave you know." Angela said, turning herself around so that she could pull against her suitcase backwards. "We don't just do that." She tugged at the suitcase again trying to get it past the bump to the stairs.

"What are you, partially physic?"

"Maybe." She replied, pushing the handle back into the suitcase and shoving it down the first flight of stairs. "Physic, and totally clever."

Raising his eyebrows at her, Agent Sorenson repeated back, "clever?"

--

Agent Sorenson was half exhausted and half relieved. He had successfully picked up an anal pathologist, a crazy rich bug and slime guy, a twelve year old physiologist (the agent could have sworn the guy's birthday was just yesterday…), a guy who spouted out random facts, and an eccentric artist.

When they arrived out of the airport, the agent took a moment to compare Booth's squints to clowns piling out of a VW Bug; the point, it was astonishing how many of them could fit in such a small cramped space without murdering each other.

"What are you smiling about, bucco?" Angela's voice snapped him out of his silly comparison.

He forced his smile to turn back down into a frown and directed everyone to the terminal to get their bags checked in.

"Flight leaves in like 20 minutes, let's go, let's go!" Like a tour leader, Sorenson counted each person as they passed him to make sure he didn't loose one of the squints. He corralled them all into the security area, and waved his badge so that they could jump the line.

"Let's go!" Agent Sorenson whined again. "Allons!" He shouted this time in French because he was getting bored with the phrase.

"Hey, handle that equipment carefully!" Hodgins whined as they shuffled their gloved hands through his equipment backpack.

"Did you know that a pregnant goldfish's name is a twit?" Mr. Nigel-Murray asked the homeland security officer who was flipping through his bags. "Oh, please be careful with that, we've got a human skull in there." The officer looked up quizzically when Sorenson realized that Mr. Murray was just a civilian to the officer.

Before the officer question the young assistant, Agent Sorenson had shoved his way through vacationing families and next to Vincent. "FBI, skull is FBI." He said, waving his badge around, and resisting the urge to smack Vincent on the back of the head. He made a mental note to do it later.

When they all made it passed security, Will took a head count. Shit. One of them was missing. Circling around he noticed that Angela being flirted with by one of the homeland security guards. Sighing for what felt like the hundredth time today, he swiftly walked over to her and dragged her away by the elbow.

Angela didn't protest as she walked away with Agent Sorenson. "Girl, you never mentioned you had a man!" The guard shouted and Angela made a face of disgust.

--

The flight would not be a long one. The squint squad and Agent Sorenson had all got onto the plane just fine. They all entered in a single file line careful not to step on anybody's feet or exclaim something about skulls or bloody massacre.

The airplane was already close to full by the time that had reached the departure gates. Agent Sorenson put the blame on Sweets who had to use the bathroom, but got lost on his way back to the café where he was supposed to meet up with everyone.

Angela, Cam and Hodgins had found seats already. Angela mushed between Cam and a pregnant mother; Hodgins in the row across from them next to a woman who looked about one hundred and eight years old. Sweets had found a place by a man who looked like he was going to cry. Agent Sorenson smiled, all was settled…except one person. "_Where was Vincent Nigel-Murray?" _He thought to himself.

"Vincent!" He grumbled underneath his breath, half the passengers were already beginning to dose off, so he didn't want to wake them. Sorenson cursed under his breath.

"Agent Sorenson!" Vincent's voice rang out over the voice of the flight attendant who was beginning to give instructions on your seat being a flotation device in the rare case of an emergency. He was waving his hands over his head and pointed to a seat next to him by the window.

"Last two seats left." He said, as he motioned for the agent to sit. Sorenson remained standing.

"I want the window seat." He demanded, crossing his arms across his chest. Slowly and reluctantly, Vincent got up and switched seats with Agent Sorenson.

"Did you know," Vincent whispered, "That Romanian President Nicolae Ceausescu was executed in 1989 by firing squad, on live television, with his wife?" Mr. Nigel-Murray sucked his teeth and returned to reading the 'Sky Mall' magazine of pointless things.

"Did you also know…?"

"Go to sleep! Or read! Or just SHUT UP!" Agent Sorenson turned to look out the window and sighed…this was going to be a much longer than necessary flight; maybe he should have flown first class. He snickered to himself, FBI doesn't get paid enough.

--

The entire squint squad had fallen asleep during the short flight. The man next to Sweets was hyperventilating like crazy as the pilot made an incredibly rough landing causing everybody to jolt awake and the physco to scream.

"We here?" Cam mumbled to Angela as she began to open her eyes. Angela nodded in reply.

Hodgins stood up right away, not even taking the time the yawn. He shuddered, and walked over to grab his luggage from the overhead compartment.

Agent Sorenson stood up to try to get a look at all of the squints. "Science squad!" Agent Sorenson shouted to try to get everyone's attention over the commotion of exiting the aircraft.

He thought he sounded like a teacher on a school field trip. Surprisingly, all of the squints turned around to face him – the squints, and some other nosy people. "Uh…meet, outside in the waiting area. Don't go anywhere." Agent Sorenson wanted to mentally smack himself in the face realizing everyone paid attention to him like he was making some kind of announcement.

"One…two…three…four…five." Agent Sorenson punched the air, all of Booth's squints had made it to New York breathing, and he meant that sarcastically, of course. "A'ight let's go!"

Before Agent Sorenson could rejoice about finally getting to hand the squints over to Agent Booth he heard a whine behind him coming from Cam, "when do we eat?"

Turning around to answer her question, Sorenson was interrupted by Vincent for the billionth time today, his sentence beginning with the same four words, "Did you know that…the human stomach…"

--

"You know, I haven't heard back from my lab yet." sounded agitated as she picked up her fork and forked a piece of her pancake.

"Relax, you'll hear from them soon. They do have lives, you know." Booth looked up from the paper he was reading.

"I will not relax, efficiency is very important. I depend on my collogues to get their jobs done as soon as possible, and I expect them to have a full understanding of that." Dr. Brennan contested.

Agent Booth took a long drink from his coffee and looked over the booth adjacent to theirs where Castle and Beckett were sitting. He chuckled, the two would make such an obvious couple…it was hilarious how people couldn't see these things.

"What's funny?" Brennan asked, raising an eyebrow, and the smile gracing Booth's face, vanished.

--

"Couldn't you see them in one of those sci-fi crazy hard core forensic shows?" Castle whispered to Kate who was sitting across from him.

"Castle?"

"Admit you could."

"They're not an unlikely pairing. Forensics work with feds all the time."

"But think about it. They're like opposite personalities!"

"You barely know them" Beckett rolled her eyes.

"I wonder if they heard from the lab yet." Castle stuffed half a piece of toast in his mouth. "Dr. Brennan did say at the latest this morning…"

"Be patient, Castle." Kate said, stealing the other half of his toast.

"No! Don't eat that, I'm dying of an unclassified sickness!" Castle said, but Beckett ate it anyway. "Now you're going to die, detective, from that same unclassified sickness." Castle joked crossing his arms across his chest.

"You have an unclassified sickness?" Dr. Brennan approached at their table with Booth in tow.

"I was joking." Castle confirmed. "She stole my toast."

"I hate that." Agent Booth said reaching his hand into the bag of M&M's Dr. Brennan was eating.

"You hate what?" Brennan questioned.

"When people take food from each other!" Agent Booth exclaimed pouring the M&M's into his mouth.

"Right…" Kate smirked.

"I haven't heard back from the lab yet. I don't know what's taking them so long, it's not like there is a time difference or…" Brennan was interrupted when she saw her team pour in from the glass doors at the front of the hotel… "Anything…" She finished her thought.

--

"Agent Booth, Dr. Brennan, Detective Beckett…" He addressed the four of the sitting at the table; well three of them, he didn't address Castle. "I'm Special Agent Will Sorenson, and I

--" He paused and motioned to Cam, Sweets, Angela, Hodgins, and Vincent. "…Have a special delivery for you guys."

"I'm confused, and I'm rarely confused." Dr. Brennan said looking at Agent Sorenson.

"When Ms. Montenegro finished the facial reconstruction of the victim, Vincent here confirmed it, the Jeffersonian said they couldn't do this case."

"Hold up, what do you mean, 'couldn't do?'" Agent Booth snorted.

"I mean, they said we could continue the investigation on those premises. They didn't specify why."

"Did you talk to them?" Dr. Brennan asked.

"We tried." Cam argued, exhaling deeply.

"Maybe you didn't argue hard enough!" Brennan replied with slight annoyance.

"Calm down, sweetie." Angela jumps in, defending Cam and eyeing Brennan.

"You're supposed to take my side." Temperance muttered.

"The point is," Agent Sorenson interfered, "is that we don't have a lab to finish the case. What's wrong with that picture?" He huffed.

"What picture?" Brennan inquired.

"He means the situation, Bones, the current situation." Booth explained.

"Why didn't he just say so? The purpose of communication is for the other person to get the message. Clearly, I didn't get the message."

"Let's just figure this all out." Cam took on the role of 'the boss.'

"Okay, we…we don't have a lab. We do, however, have the remains."

"We have facial reconstruction, and have positively identified the victim, correct?" Bones looked at her team of scientists who nodded in response. "Let's just start with what we know, and we'll improvise from there."

On cue, Hodgins began to lay out the facts so far gathered from the case. "The container you found near the body never actually contained the body. There were no particulates from the clothing the victim was wearing, or any other signs that would point to the fact that she had been concealed in the storage box; I believe it was thrown in after the body was tossed into the water as a detour."

Dr. Brennan held up a finger. "You said she? We confirmed her gender?"

"Yes, victim was female. I estimate her age to be around twenty-four years old. Cause of death has not yet been identified. There were virtually no defensive wounds, which I find oddly strange considering there was evidence present that her ankles and wrists had been bound together. Dr. Hodgins found the remainder of the rope that was used to bind together her ankles." Vincent said.

"Do we have anything else?" Dr. Brennan pushed for more.

"Before we were thrown from the place, I did get a chance to make a facial reconstruction, and Agent Sorenson had his people run it through the Missing Persons database while we were on our way here." Angela pulled out of her laptop bag a sketch of a young woman; her eyes not focused anywhere in particular and her mouth somewhere in between a smile and a frown.

"She have a name?" Booth took the sketch from Brennan.

"Marina Maitland, but that's an alias. Used to go by Clemence, born outside of the country, Northern part of France. Used to have ties with like, it wasn't a mob, or a gang, it was…like a sick club. She has basically no family. She's got people, but they're pretty much disconnected. They live here in the U.S. though. She's got a sister who lives close by, that's the last person she spoke to, she might know something."

"The way you said that, there's something wrong with the sister?" Brennan asked.

"Right. She has one sister who lives at a psychiatric clinic here in New York, was recently moved here from New Jersey because she was having trouble there. Victim has no husband, but she does have a son, just eleven months old."

"She has a son?" Booth's eyes lowered. Sorenson nodded.

"Where's the kid?" Beckett asked, brow furrowing.

"That's what we need to find out."

--

"So we have an abduction case?" Booth asked Sorenson as the squints went back to their new hotels room to get ready for the day. The lobby was nearing empty; families had already hopped into their monstrously large tour busses and were off for the day.

"Looks like it – I give it three days to maybe a week, then we'll call it a homicide, whether or not we have the body." Sorenson said picking up his pace unintentionally.

"We'll find the kid." Booth gritted his teeth.

"Says who?"

"We've got the best crime solvers in the world here, man. We—Bones and her people can identify a body from mush, and find the killer from a skin cell they left behind. We solve cannibalistic murders for fun; we say we got this one. We're gonna get that little baby boy back alive." Booth sighed.

"You keep saying 'we,' I just don't see you as the 'microscope' type." Sorenson commented.

"It's just become a habit. Bones and I, we're partners, and Bones, she kinda came in a package – you get the anthropologist and you also get the whole shebang, delivery service included."

"Hey, it's a pretty good deal. Beckett over there got a nine-year old writer monkey with a bow on his head just looking for someone to annoy."

"There's something going on between them." Booth stated, and Sorenson coughed un-subtly. Just then, Booth saw everyone begin to file out of the elevators; they were all dressed and ready for a day of staring into microscopes, and cutting into corpses.

"What's the game plan?" Hodgins asked, rubbing his hands together excitedly, he was obviously excited to be out of the lab for once.

"I don't want to play a game." Brennan whined to Booth, eyeing Hodgins suspiciously.

"We're not playing a game, Bones, it's an expression." Bones raised on eyebrow in confusion, but the look quickly vanished from her face.

"So what are we doing today?" She asked, quickly getting back on track.

"We're splitting up." Sorenson said.

"Castle and Beckett will go to the family," Booth said handing them a slip of paper with the address on it.

"Angela and I will go to the apartment where she lived." Sorenson said, pulling Angela away from the squints.

"Bones and I will go to the sister in Jersey." Booth said.

"You're just excited to go see a physco." Teased, Cam.

"I am not." Booth defended. "They can be very frightening people. I just want a crack at this one." Sorenson rolled his eyes.

"The rest of you will go check out the lab for the week. There should be a, Dr. Reece waiting for you there, so just introduce yourselves and he or she should let you in."

--

The drive to Jersey was quiet. Booth was almost completely mute except for the few curses he let out at other drivers.

"Do you want me to drive?" Brennan offered, as she always did.

"No." Booth stated sternly.

"Fine. Just, don't kill us."

"Kill us? Bones, I'm an excellent driver." Booth was getting defensive, putting up his walls, ready for anything that attacked him, well, almost anything. Half an hour later, the sun was still in the sky, and they were getting very close to their destination.

"Don't provoke the physcos, okay?" Booth instructed Brennan.

"What makes you think I would do that?"

"It's just your human nature."

"Provoking physcos is not my human nature, Booth. One would find that rather offensive. Most people find me quite charming, and occasionally, funny."

"I'm just saying."

"Well, I don't appreciate what you're saying. You can't just march around to everyone, Booth, and tell them not to be freak out the freaks in the physco home because it's just what they were born to do. It certainly isn't for you to judge. It's for the physcos to judge."

"Bones, it's like being in a totally different interrogation room for the first time. You don't ask the same questions."

"Why not? They're human, not animals in cages."

"No, but their mental condition is fragile."

"If they're mental condition is so fragile, then what makes them trustworthy people to get answers from."

"Look, Bones, either way, this woman, Chasity Ann, she's all the family we have listed for the victim. She might be mental, but that doesn't mean she has amnesia. She could very well tell us things that she doesn't even know the significance to, just have some faith." Booth made a sharp left turn and onto a street where all the buildings were painted grey. The short, stubby buildings housed windows that looked barely taller than Hodgins was.

"Have a little faith, Booth? In you, or the physco?" Brennan asked, and Booth made no comment.

--

The mental hospital was clean, just like all hospitals were. Patients sat in the lobby with their nurses talking either to themselves or their imaginary friends. The murmur of conversation was inaudible. Booth flashed his badge to quickly get passed the front desk. Sometimes, Brennan wished she could have one too just for the perks it gave the holder.

They were to speak with Chasity Ann Maitland in a little enclosed room. The room much resembled an interrogation room, minus the cameras and one way mirror that usually adorned the wall. Ms. Maitland was sitting quietly when the peeled open the heavy metal door; her stringy brown hair pulled back into a low ponytail. Her hazel pupils were downwards and she was lightly rocking back and forth in her uncomfortable plastic chair.

"Chasity?" Booth addressed her, but she never looked up. She looked worn and tired, sick of living here, sick of breathing the air, and being haunted by the same nightmares over and over again.

"Chasity?" Booth tried to get the woman's attention again, but she just continued to sway back and forth like a palm tree in the tropics on a breezy day. Keeping his cool, Booth simply continued on.

"Chasity, what do you remember about your sister, Marina?" Booth asked, but he received no response.

"Chasity, Marina, what do you know about her?" Brennan tried, trying to get a view of the woman's face.

"She was pretty." Chasity spoke for the first time, her voice course like sandpaper. It was void of venom, but full of distrust and desperation. "Pretty little Marina who took ballet on Saturday mornings. Pretty Marina who Mama named after the sea where she was born. Marina who performed for guests when they came, and mon pere would say, 'Apporte-tu de l'eau pour ta soeur, s'il te plait.' And Marina who's French flowed like a silky smooth scarf being waved into the air. Marina who's dead as the dead can be." Chasity paused, inhaling and exhaling deeply.

"How and when were you informed of Marina's passing?" Brennan asked, wondering how she knew.

"It's intuition." She replied to Brennan's question.

"When does your intuition say she died?" Booth asked.

"Booth, we can't trust her intuition!" Brennan whispered, Booth shot her a look.

"A long time ago. Now why must you bring that whore back into my life?" Chasity's eyes rolled up slightly, but went back down to her hands the moment they met Agent Booth's.

"Chasity, your sister was murdered."

"I know." She replied in monotone.

"So?"

"She deserved a better place than this hell hole, maybe she deserved better, I forget. I don't speak ill of the dead…"

"Did you know she had a son?"

"Don't speak ill of the dead, don't speak ill of the dead." Chasity murmured like a mantra over and over again, her eyes never leaving her hands once.

"Thank you, Chasity…" Agent Booth cautiously stood up, and motioned for Dr. Brennan to follow.

Bones turned around briefly before slowly exiting the room – she paused briefly as she heard the chanting continue behind her, "don't speak ill of the dead."

Outside the mental hospital, shook off the last of her nerves, and slid into the passenger seat of the car. "She thinks the kid is dead." Brennan said, as she buckled her seat belt and turned the radio on.

"Well he's not." Booth said stubbornly, switching the station.

"Booth, stop being fussy with the music," Bones changed it back. "You can't prove that." She argued, crossing her arms across the chest and tweaking the A.C.

"You can't prove he's dead either."

"Well then in that case, maybe we should stop assuming he's either."

"What is he then, Bones? Some kind of in between? Where's physically alive, but mentally he's gone?" Booth changed the radio station again.

"That's mere speculation, Booth. I'm just saying…" She trailed off.

"Well I'm just saying that we," he paused. "We're better off looking for something than nothing."

Bones sighed and returned her attention back to the empty road. She reached forward and turned the radio off – sometimes, it was better just to say nothing at all.

End note: Review?

I promise, promise, promise – swear on the role of the Sugar Plum Fairy that I'll update as SOON has humanely possible!


	4. Family Ties

a/n: Honesty moment: Last chapter = slight filler chapter. I wasn't sure how to make the story work without it. End honesty moment. Minor correction: What I wanted to say was that the victim had no family that ever spoke to her; the last person she spoke to was her sister. The changes can be seen in the last chapter, if it doesn't make sense. Sometimes I forget to think when I'm writing. Begin chapter:

Chapter 4: 

The sun was just passing the midway point when they reached the family home. The ride had been strangely quiet, the time was mostly spent with Beckett concentrating solely on the road in front of her and Castle drumming a random beat on his thighs. The bass on the radio thumped quietly in the background with a woman's voice singing softly to inaudible music notes.

"Guess the song." Castle said as they drove through a lonely highway.

"Castle, I have no idea." Beckett said, gripping the steering wheel.

"Guess." Castle sported his signature goofy grin and continued to slap loudly.

"I will shoot your hands off." Kate threatened, jokingly of course, but Castle got the message and stopped.

"Shouldn't our priority be finding the child?" Castle asked. It was so like him to go from being a child to a serious adult.

"We are. If we find her killer, it's likely that we will find the kidnapper. Besides, we are working two cases at once. Agent Sorenson is working more on finding the baby than the killer."

"What will happen to the kid once we find him?" _'If we find him." _Castle thought in his mind, but he chased the thoughts away.

"Maybe we'll contact some relatives." Kate said, hoping to maintain some optimism.

"He probably doesn't have any. Her family probably doesn't even know that he exists!"

"Castle, he'll probably go into foster care!" She hated that she was angry with him for caring. She wasn't angry; she wished that he would just stop with the negative scenarios. She huffed, and focused her eyes back on the road and Castle took it as a signal to stop talking and start drumming again.

They arrived at the family home. The house was reasonably large, the walls crawling with long green vines and the windows overlooking the narrow street in front of them. The front lawn was very spacious. A well-maintained garden greeted the pathway up to the short flight of stairs. Beckett inhaled deeply as she prepared to knock on the big wooden doors. Castle shifted his weight uncomfortably behind her and coughed softly.

Beckett tapped on the door and it was just a short moment later when a woman with silver strands of hair came to greet them.

"Yes?" Her voice was delicate and high pitched, a little bit as if she was struggling to annunciate the only syllable in the word.

"Hi, Mrs. Maitland, I'm Detective Beckett from NYPD –"

"NYPD? This is New Jersey, honey." A tall man had appeared behind the woman. He had deep-set eyes and bushy eyebrows that arched over his double-eyelids like the moon.

"Yes, we're investigating a case involving your daughter." Beckett finished, forgetting to introduce Castle.

"Our daughter? Clemence?" The woman asked her face lined with concern.

"Clemmy hasn't been to the city yet, she just got here, what could the NYPD possibly want with an eight year old girl?" The man sounded annoyed now, his hands gripping the door ready to slam it at any second.

"Not Clemence, Mrs. Maitland, Marina." The concern on the woman's face disappeared and her husband or so Beckett assumed, became even angrier.

"We don't know anything about Marina. We stopped speaking to her once she graduated from high school; not that we spoke much to her then either."

"May we come in?" Beckett asked, hoping they could extend the conversation further indoors.

"We told you we had nothing to say, but, if you insist, detectives." The woman had addressed Castle as a detective, and Beckett mentally slapped herself for not introducing him.

"I'm sorry, I'm the detective. This is Richard Castle, he's shadowing me."

"Richard Castle, ey? The novelist." The man said, shaking his hand, smiling slightly. He was obviously a fan. Beckett rolled her eyes mentally and motioned for him to follow her into the living room.

Once they were comfortably seated in the room, they took a moment to absorb their surroundings. Paintings were hung on the walls and a grand piano sat opposite of the brick fireplace. The centerpiece of the room was a chandelier that glistened in the light of the remainder of the sun.

The three adults sat awkwardly in the room, Mrs. Maitland had gone to the kitchen to fetch some water upon her husband's request.

"Papa? Qu'est-ce qui se passe? Est-ce que cette femme est une agente de police?" _What's going on? Is that a police officer? _A small voice broke the thick silence in the room. A little girl was peering through the doorway, her large green eyes coated in tears.

"Oui. Retourne a ta chambre, Clemence." _Yes. Go back to your room. _The man seemed agitated with the little girl's presence.

"Don't mind her." The woman had returned with the glasses of water. Beckett whispered a thank you, and set her glass down on the table in front of her. "That's Clemence. We just adopted her from France a little while ago. Her parents disappeared. We're starting to teach her English. Clemmy, come here."

The little girl walked over, cautiously, eyeing Castle and Beckett suspiciously, as she did so. "Say hello." Mrs. Maitland waved to Castle and Beckett.

"Hi." The little girl said quietly.

"Bonsoir." Castle replied smiling.

"Bonsoir, Monsieur," said Clemmence. "Parlez-vous francais?" She looked excited that another person in the room spoke some French.

"Un peu. Parlez-vous anglais?" Castle asked back. _A little, do you speak English?_

"Un peu. Ma mère et mon père et le prof à l'ecole essayent de me l'apprendre." She giggled. "Mais, c'est un peu difficile." A little. My mom and my dad and the teacher at school are trying to teach me, but it is a little hard.

"Clemence. "Clemence. Viens à ta chambre." "_Clemence, go to your room." _The man seemed more annoyed than before and Beckett couldn't help but to wonder why he was so upset with her.

"Mais il est très sympa. Je veux parler avec lui!" But he is very nice. I want to talk to him! "Je veux retourner chez moi! Je veux aussi parler avec la femme qui avait été au parc!" _I want to go home! I want to talk to the woman at the park!_

"Il n'existe pas une femme au parc, Clemence!" The man was very angry now, and the little girl was very upset. She stormed to her room and the man inhaled deeply.

"What park do you take her to?" Castle asked immediately, as soon as the girl had disappeared back into her room.

"I don't know, her brother takes her sometimes, and sometimes her babysitter. The both of us are at work most of the time, so we don't have the time to take her to the park." The man replied.

"Is her brother home?" Beckett asked. She didn't really know what Castle was getting at, but she assumed it was significant. She was unsure why she even trusted him sometimes.

The woman nodded and shouted the boys name through the house. "Guillaume!" She shouted his name. "Viens!"

"J'arrive!" He shouted back and came running down the stairs. He was a fine looking boy who had brown surfer like hair, the kind you could swish around in the wind and in front of girls to show off. "Qu'est-ce qui se passe, maman?" _What's going on mom?_

"Ils vourdraient savoir quel parc tu et sa soeur…" _They want to know what park you and your sister…_She didn't finish her sentence, and he answered.

"East River. It's in Manhattan, and I've only taken her there twice. She says the babysitter takes her." He said, but he grimaced as he said it.

"You took her all the way to Manhattan!?" The man practically had steam coming out of his ears.

"It was just once or twice!"

"You weren't supposed to take her there!" His voice boomed. His eyes sat widely on his head, almost like the eyeballs were going to pop right out of their sockets; Castle took a step back.

"Zoey took her to Manhattan?" This time it was the mother. Her voice was icy as if Jack Frost had just blown on her breath as it came out.

"Zoey's the babysitter I presume," the woman nodded. "We'll need her full name and her phone number." Beckett said and the woman nodded again.

"That bitch." The man murmured under his breath. "I'll fire her. I'm going to go fire her right now, she had no right!" He stormed from the room. Beckett looked at the son, Guillaume's eyes. They were clouded with worry and fear, his hands were shaking. Noticing her eyes on him, he quickly looked away and folded his arms over his sternum, hiding his trembling hands.

"If that's all…" the mother began, "Clemmy has dance class and Guillaume has a test to study for." Her glare sent him straight out the living room. Kate nodded and motioned for her and Castle to leave. They walked out shoulder to shoulder, like the always did. It was no wonder why people often mistaken them for couple.

"The father's a bit sketchy." Castle said as soon as he and Beckett were in the middle of the front pathway. "It's pretty odd that her name is Clemence."

"I think the brother's hiding something. They adopted her. They didn't request for a specific name."

"How old do you figure him for?"

"No more than seventeen," Beckett sighed.

"I -- Ouch!" Castle's sentence was cut off when he felt a blunt object hit the back of head. He reached his hand behind to rub his hair and looked around to find the culprit. Beckett smirked as she bent over and picked up a whiteboard marker. An ordinary green dry-erase marker, the kind that they used in the precinct, on the murder board. Beckett turned around to see the window towards the top of the house open. The boy stood there with a white board and a messily scrawled out message.

"_Meet me at Bennett's at 10:00 tonight. It's a little café right next to ERP." _Castle squinted to read the message; Beckett remembered that he did not have his contacts in.

"ERP?" She said quietly.

"East River Park." Castle replied without hesitating. Beckett nodded at the young boy and he closed the window and wiped the board off with his sleeve.

"Told you. There's something he wants us, but not his parents to know." Beckett said while slipping into the drivers'' seat of the car.

"Who is the woman at the park?"

"I don't know. Only Clemence really knows. Ryan and Esposito will go down to the park tomorrow and ask to see if there are any women who usually come alone, and if they know a girl by the name of Clemence or Zoey."

"Zoey what?"

"Valelot, Zoey Valelot." Just then, Beckett's phone let out a shrill ring, and she picked it up. "Beckett."

"_Hey, it's Esposito. We've got a hit on your girl Zoey Valelot." _

She put it on speaker, wedged it between her and Castle. "Yah, does she have a record?"

"_Nah man, she's just seventeen years old." _Castle looked shocked.

"How'd you find her?" he asked.

"_We're detectives. She is an early high school graduate. Apparently, she is enrolled in NYU, graduated after junior year of high school. She is taking up linguistics and medical ethics at NYU. That's how she met Bauer." _

"Who"

"_Jean Bauer. That's the angry dad that was in the room, right?" _

"What? How'd you know?"

"_Dude, Beckett texts faster and more discreetly than you think." _This time Ryan spoke.

"Guys, what about Bauer, do we have anything on him? Does he have a criminal record?"

"_Yah. Zoey takes his medical ethics class at NYU where he teaches. One hit on grand-theft, and assault of an officer."_

"We'll get his alibi."

"_His wife, Elena Maitland came out clean though." _

"Alright, thanks you guys."

"_Hold up, Agent Sorenson called us back. Him and the artist chick when to go her apartment. They didn't find anything suspicious. A ton of left over take-out in the fridge, a couple of pictures, some of them in the trash. Some baby stuff. The beds unmade and the door was unlocked. Agent Booth and Dr. Brennan visited the sister. She's crazy; they said she wasn't really much help." _

"Figures." Muttered Castle.

"Great. Thanks, we'll be here until late tonight, but make sure tomorrow morning you're at the park trying to figure out who this woman Clemence spoke to is."

"_Sounds good, boss."_ Esposito said, and a click indicated that he had hung up the phone.

"Are we going to talk to Zoey?" Castle asked Beckett.

"We'll wait until we can go with Agent Booth and Dr. Brennan," she did not sound happy about it, but nevertheless she said it anyway, and in a way that enforced a strong understanding.

"Fine." Castle agreed, "I say that we should go get dinner."

"Take out?"

"We're not on a stake-out, we have until 10 PM, food, you know, like sit down in a restaurant, they hand you a menu kind of thing."

Beckett rolled her eyes. "I've never heard of it."

"Funny. I don't know anything good around here."

"Well, neither do I."

"I was hoping you'd say that…" Castle trailed off and waved around his fancy iPhone. "That is precisely why I have an app called 'urban spoon,' he almost squealed, always excited by his fancy technology. "So we've got Indian, Chinese, Japanese, Italian, Hamburgers, Thai, Korean, Vietnamese, and Southern. What are you up for." He hoped that she was impressed.

"Let's get diner food, it's probably the easiest. Plus, I feel like we had Japanese recently." She said sarcastically.

"Burgers, fries and shakes it is!" Castle exclaimed and punched the address into her GPS. Kate couldn't help but to smile and relax her shoulders. She wasn't sure if it was a good or bad that thing Castle possessed the ability to make her relax.

They arrived at the restaurant within half and hour. It was a small cozy diner with the shiny red booths like they had in the movies in the 50's. The heat was turned up all the way and the customers were all busy slurping down their shakes, fanning their sweaty faces with their hands and shedding whatever layers they could shed. Beckett took her seat in a booth across from Castle as she fanned her face and removed her jacket delicately.

"It's really hot in here; why do they have the heater on in the middle of summer?" Castle asked, as he opened the sticky menu.

Outside, cars were buzzing by. The general feeling of summer lingered on Kate's tongue as she leaned in to take a sip of her milkshake. "So," she broke the thick layer of silence that clung to the heat like vines to the side of a house." What are we going to do for four-ish, five hours?" She guestimated the time.

"My, my, is the work-a-holic Detective Beckett saying there is nothing police related to be done?"

"There's a mound of paperwork waiting for me back at the precinct, we could go back there if that's what you are suggesting." She trailed off, wiping the spills of strawberry dairy liquid with the corner of paper towel.

"I'd prefer something else." Castle said, stealing a French fry off her plate.

"So what do we do?"

"Let's just…finish eating, discuss the case, do whatever comes to mind." Kate smiled, she liked that he was spontaneous. She paused mid-thought and her eyes went wide; since when did she start listing the aspects she liked about him?

"Beckett! Beckett! Kate!" Castle was calling her and waving his hands in front of her face with a look of genuine concern.

"Yah, what? I'm here." She popped another crispy fry into her mouth. Castle stared at her lips as she shaped them to fit around the fat little red straw stuck in her milkshake.

"Have you ever been to France?" He asked her after snapping out of his trance.

"No, we had planned on going the summer of my sophomore year;" she paused, "that's the same year…" She did not finish her sentence, but Castle nodded in response acknowledging that they were on the same page. He knew her mom had been murdered that year. "When I was little though, my mom used to sing me these French songs…I don't remember which ones anymore, but that's one of my favorite memories of her, that's why I wanted to go to France in the first place; aside from the fact that it's supposedly gorgeous. I used to want to know so badly what she was singing to me, but before I could ask her I would have fallen asleep and the next morning I would have completely forgotten to ask."

"So cultured." Castle joked lightly; he knew that it was a sensitive topic. "My mom used to sing me show tunes. I always imagined that a kid born in the eighties would grow up with their parents singing them 'the Beatles.'

"All you need is love, Lucy in the sky with diamonds, and give me all your lovin'?"

"Exactly." Castle wiggled his eyebrows, a small giggle escaped her, and Castle shot her a Cheshire cat grin.

"Why so happy?"

"It's just, it's difficult to make you laugh. I feel accomplished." He batted his eyelashes and she rolled her eyes.

"Did you know that there's a betting pool going around at the precinct?" She began. "Apparently, it seems that our new friends at the FBI put in hefty amounts on us getting together during this case. Agent Booth says that Angela is quite the matchmaker."

"The artist?"

"Yup. Says she's been pushing Dr. Brennan and him together for forever…"

"How successful is that?"

"Booth didn't say. I think it's pretty successful…but that might just be the relationship taking it's own course."

"So you're not mad about this game they're playing?" Castle questioned.

"Well, why would I be? They're going to loose all their money anyways."

"…or we could put large amounts on ourselves, and take all their cash."

"Yeah there's always that." Kate nodded in agreement and reached over the pull the check from Castle's side of the table to hers.

"You're sneaky, Kate, but not that sneaky." She would have gripped it tighter, but she lost it when she heard her first name in his voice. He gave her a winning smile and neatly placed his credit card down and waved the waiter over. He waltzed over and made eyes at Beckett then glared at Castle before leaving.

Kate stuck out her tongue. "The heat just brings out the best in us doesn't it?" Beckett offered him a small smile.

"Don't blame him, I'd be jealous too." He winked at her, and her heart fluttered. Her face grew warm and she let her mind wander about him. She bit her lower lip as she thought about the betting pool back at work. She was secretly scared that she might give in before the end of this case. She had been holding it back for a while, in her opinion, she'd been quite successful, but now she wasn't sure she could hold up the façade for much longer.

"Thanks." She said with a subtle curve of her lips. The waiter returned with Castle's card. This time as he placed it down, Castle shot him a death glare and quickly scrambled away.

"Nice." Kate said.

They stood up to walk out the door. The temperature outside was not much different from inside the diner. The summer air was still without a breeze. It was mildly humid, but nothing compared to Miami or Hawaii. The sun still held it's position in the cloudless sky. Castle watched Beckett as she walked, her hips swaying to an invisible rhythm. Her eyes focused ahead of her and her breathing steady. Once in awhile she would lick her lips or bite on her cheek.

Beckett knew that Castle was staring at her. She decided not to disturb his train of thoughts. She assumed that he was most likely trying to figure out a way to write her France story into his next Nikki Heat book, but she knew that by saying that she was just kidding herself. She knew him well enough to know that he was most likely trying to break her down for no reason other than to satisfy his own curiosity about her. In the back of her mind, she knew that this story was not going to appear in the next Nikki Heat.

"What do you think about Booth and Brennan?" She asked him absent-mindedly staring off into space as the aimlessly wandered around the block.

"What do you mean? Like do I like them?"

"No. I mean, what do you think about their relationship."

"They're probably saying the same thing about us right now."

"Yeah, probably."

"Agent Booth drew the line."

"What line?" Kate asked, confused.

"When you ladies decided to go to bed yesterday night, Agent Booth and I got talking. He mentioned that he was the one the drew the line and said that they couldn't have a relationship in a professional environment."

"Well they still act like they're in one."

"True." Castle agreed.

"Not having a relationship doesn't change your feelings towards the other person. Especially your partner whom you work closely with." Kate caught herself before she spewed out the words, '_trust me, I know.' _However, despite the fact that she had not vocalized her thoughts, she felt as if Castle knew that those were her next words. Perhaps she was just being a little bit paranoid.

"Yes, very true. However…the whole marriage as soon as you're in love aspect makes good money for divorce attorney's."

"Does it?" She raised a brow at him.

"It does. Trust me, I have learned my lesson. Marriage does not declare love."

"Speaking from experience?" She smirked.

"Absolutley."

"Is that your stand on relationships then?" she asked.

"I don't have a stand on relationships in general."

"Why not?"

"Relationships depend on the people in them Beckett. You can't classify general relationships because people aren't really general, espcially when you put them together. Of course, I have maybe a slight biased opinion on marriage. Marriage is the test of one's relationship. It's where you learn to be completley loyal, put up with the other person's music, the time they wake up, the cereal they eat, their choices of television dramas, the length of showers they take, their annoying habits, and when you bicker – god when you bicker, you can not get away from that person. I'm not against it, but for now, let's just say I'm not ring shopping anytime soon."

Kate's affection seemed to have just grown a little more preceeding his speech. She liked that he wasn't one to jump on marriage right away. She also liked that he didn't label relationships. She hated labels.

"How about you?" He returned her question.

"What? Pardon?"

"How about you? Do you have an opinion on relationships?"

"I don't know. I understand the whole 'keep I professional thing,' but sometimes I feel like there really isn't anything you can do about it. I don't know. Relationships are so cliché, love is so cliché?"

"But is it really?" She squirmed a little bit. They had settled on a little stone bench in front of a bustling ice cream parlor. She had hoped that the crowd would die down and they could get ice cream because she was just about ready to over heat and the almost non-existent space between her and Castle wasn't helping at all. She couldn't tell him to move over, however, because a family had squeezed in with their ice cream on the other side. It had been Castle's idea to be nice and scoot over so they could squeeze in all six members.

Castle was somewhat perplexed as he reflected on their conversation. Where they really having a deep conversation about relationships? She sighed, and shrugged her shoulders. "I don't know, Castle, I really don't know. Maybe someday someone will come and make me fall head over heels and maybe we'll jump into marriage, and maybe then we'll be visiting divorce attorneys and dividing up our furniture, and maybe we just won't get married."

Her voice had risen considerably and she hadn't noticed. She had caught the attention of the family whom they were sharing the bench with, but they continued on eating their dripping ice cream anyway, just like any other New Yorker would do.

"You think we'll be able to talk to the girl alone?" Castle changed the subject abruptly back to the case.

"Not without her parents being present." Beckett said as she smushed closer to the family to let an elderly man squeeze in next to Castle. Her pulse and her breathing both quickened at the same time. She was completely pressed against his side, their hands touching. She was tempted to just put her head on his shoulder instead of holding it up.

"That might be a problem."

"We'll see if we can work something out. We definitely need to get her to talk to us. I'm going to have Agent Booth and Dr. Brennan head over talk to the babysitter."

Just then, Beckett's phone rang. She held up a finger to Castle and stood up. Castle followed and the two left the bench and went into a more quiet area. Kate hit 'speakerphone' and greeted the person on the other line.

"_Detective Beckett, this is Agent Sorenson_." Will begin.

"Hello, Agent Sorenson." Castle said from beside Beckett. Beckett heard a sigh of annoyance from him, and she frowned. He didn't let the annoyance dominate for long though, he quickly proceeded to brief them on the details he had acquired from the lab.

"_I talked to Dr. Hodgins earlier about the container that should have contained the body. It seems as if there are traces of her clothing that she was supposedly wearing when she was killed. However, it was clear that she wasn't in their for long. The lab's written it off as a diversion." _

"Did they find the source of the container?" Castle asked.

"_What, no. That's your job." _

"Correction, it's your job. Your people track the container, we find out if the seller knew the killers or the victim." Beckett fired back unexcepectly. Sorenson was silent on the other line for a while. "Did you find out when she changed her name?"

"_Agent Booth is looking into that." _Sorenson's voice sounded more sinister this time, clearly affected by Kate's comment.

"Has he found anything?"

"_I don't know Kate, I'm sure he'll call you when he does have something." _

Kate's face stiffened, in fact her whole body stiffened. "It's Beckett." She nearly snarled, "I'll call you if Castle and I have anything."

"_Listen, don't make this personal." _

"You think I'm trying to make this personal?"

"_Obviously, you are."_

"Don't you even go there. If anybody's making it personal it's you, so I suggest you get your head straight, focus on the case, and never fucking go there again." Without allowing him to reply, Kate Beckett hit the 'end' button on her phone with an unnecessary about of force. Castle heard her sigh.

"You okay?" He asked her. She nodded.

"I'm just frustrated. What time is it?"

"It's just around 7:15."

"That leaves us roughly two hours and forty five minutes to kill." She calculated quickly in her head.

"Yup." The pair stood silent for a moment before deciding that they should continue to walk. "Did you hear the mother's French accent?"

"Castle, I don't speak a word of French besides, 'bonjour' which I pronounce, 'bawn-zhour.'"

"You own one of those French phrase books for traveling don't you? With all the fake pronunciation and everything?"

"Yup. I got it when I thought we were going to go to France." Castle could hear a hint of sadness in her voice and he stopped walking to look at her. She still stood profile to him, despite the fact that she could feel his eyes on her.

"You'll go one day."

"What makes you say that?" She still refused to face him.

"Because you're Katherine Beckett. If you want to go to France, you'll go. There's nothing that's going to stop you." She couldn't help but to let the smile creep up on her face.

"Thanks, Castle." She knew that he could be an arrogant jerk, but sometimes, he could be the cutest, sweetest novelist she'd ever met. She could feel herself blushing and she was thankful that she hadn't turned around to look him in the eye just yet. "What were you going to say about her accent?" She changed the subject quickly and averted her eyes from his lips, which she hadn't noticed she was staring at through the corner of her eye.

"Well first off, the man spoke Quebecois, not French."

"I thought French-Canadian was French…"

"It is. But not authentic French. French from France is authentic French. The woman, her French was not French-Canadian, but there was still something off about it."

"So?" Beckett pressured for him to get to the point.

"So, her two kids are adopted from France."

"So?"

"I don't know. I just thought I'd point it out. Maybe it's just a little bit suspicious." The pair had finally decided to settle on top of a small stone bench in the middle of the park across the street from where they were supposed to meet.

"Is Paris all it's blown up to be?"

"What do you mean?"

"Is it really the city of lights and the city of love?"

"Yeah, mostly, but you have to go there to really experience any of it. I can see why Clemence misses home. The Eiffel tower glitters at night. Literally, the lights all sparkle. It's really something. It's amongst my top favorite cities. Along with home, Venice, various parts of California."

"I just feel like it's one of those things I missed out on. My god-mom offered to take me junior year, but I just couldn't get myself to say yes, so we went to Hawaii instead."

"Trust me, Kate, one day we'll go." Castle's voice fell a little bit when he realized his slip. He had said 'we,' and he noticed that Kate had heard it as well because she wasn't even smirking, she was grinning. "What?" He played it dumb.

"Nothing." She replied, the smile still plastered to her face.

"No, there's definitely something." Castle wasn't sure why he was pushing for a reaction. She could very well be angry with him and decide not to speak with him for the remainder of the case. Just the smallest part of him was curious, but the portion of his mind was growing and he eventually let the curiosity dominate over his fear.

"It's just that you said 'we.'"

"Oui. I did say 'we.'" Castle tried to play it cool, and add some of his signature humor into his response.

"Are you therefore implying that you and I will one day go to Paris?"

"Perhaps." His lips twitched and his heart raced. He was nervous and he could tell that she saw that in him, like when a suspect struggled to answer a question.

"And why would you assume that?" She was teasing him, but because she answered in question form, Castle's nervousness eased up a little bit and he could feel his hear beat slowing down just a little bit. Kate bit lower-lip, a habit she had when she became unsure of herself. She wanted to know the answer, but she was also afraid of the answer. Castle remained silent, his hands in his lap his eyes focused on the setting sun in front of them. He couldn't think of a clever response and he was at loss for words when it came down to the serious response.

"It was just a slip. I'm sorry." His voice quivered ever so slightly when he finally spoke.

"Was it really?"

"No."

"Then what was it?" she was puzzled, she knew that anybody else could answer the question in a heartbeat, but neither of them could quite figure out the answer alone. "I'll give you until tomorrow night to figure it out." She reasoned that a little bit of time might help him come up with a more eloquent answer. He nodded in response and the two returned back to staring at the sun. The humid evening held it's breath for the longest time before Beckett's phone rang and cut a knife into the thick tension in the air.

"Beckett."

"_Detective Beckett? It's Agent Booth." _

"Agent Booth, what do you have for me?" Instead of putting the phone on speaker, she leaned in close to Castle and pressed the phone in between their ears so that they could both hear. She would have put it on speaker if there wasn't a group of afterschool four to five year olds roaming the park.

"_We looked into your name thing."_

"Alright. What did you find out?"

"_She changed her name just before she adopted Guillaume and Clemence from France."_

"Before?"

"_Yeah, they were adopted in December, she got it legally changed in November."_

"Legally changed, okay, so that doesn't mean it's an alias, she just didn't like her name."

"_Or there was a reason she wanted her name to be different before she adopted the children."_

"Ask him where the kids were adopted from; what adoption agency." Castle whispered to Kate.

"Agent Booth, do you know where the kids were adopted from?"

"_France."_

"With what adoption agency?"

"_We're not sure. We've been looking for a while, but neither of the children's names is listed with adopted children in the past year. We've been looking into previous years, but so far we've go no luck." _

"Well, just give us a heads up if you find out with which. We'll be in a little later to take a look at it all."

"_Right. Well, we need to coral the squints back to their hotel rooms at around ten or so, so what time do you think you'll be here because I'm pretty sure you'll need a lab pass to get in." _

"We're supposed to meet up with the boy at ten. He told us to meet him at a café. I suppose that we could just take a look tomorrow morning."

"_That would be good." _Beckett could hear Dr. Brennan's voice in the background babbling a ton of scientific crap.

"_Booth are you listening to me?"_ Dr. Brennan said

"_Yeah, listen, I'm gonna go. You know the hotel if you need us, so we'll talk to you guys later." _Booth hung up, but neither Castle nor Beckett moved from their positions.

"What time is it?" Beckett asked, finally pulling the phone out from in between them and checking the time. "It's like 9:15, think we should head over to the café?"

"What's the rush?" Castle asked.

"Do you have a better idea?"

Castle grinned and walked from the bench down to the area by the water. He bent down on his knees and picked up a stone from the grass. He examined it carefully, feeling the edges and the texture of both sides. Beckett watched as stood up and tossed the stone into the water; it skipped three times and Castle turned around and said, "Your turn."

"I can't skip stones. I never figured out how to."

"Well, never better time to learn." He heard her sigh, but it was a content sigh and not her usual annoyed or frustrated sigh. "Just pick a stone, preferably a smooth, flat one." He instructed.

She bent down on her hands and knees and looked around for a smooth, stone. When she finally found one, she stood up and found that she was face to face with Castle who had popped up out of nowhere and was now standing right in front of her.

"Now what?" she asked, not moving or flinching.

"Now take the stone between your thumb and index finger." She did as she was instructed, still keeping the close proximity between them. "Bend your wrist back." He moved and stood behind her, positioning her wrist into the proper position to prepare for flinging the rock into the water.

He gently placed a hand on her lip. "Bend your knees; get lower." He lightly pushed her shoulders downwards so that her knees were bent. "Good." He encouraged. He ran his hand up her spine causing her to develop goosebumps and feel thankful for the fact that she had put her jacket back on over her shirt. His hand returned to resting on her hand with the stone. "Ready?" he whispered in her ear. She nodded.

"On three." She nodded again. "One…two…three!" On three, they both flung the stone out into the water and watched it skip twice rather successfully before disappearing into the depths just like their victim had. "You're a natural." He complimented.

"Thank you." Castle's hand still remained on her hips as they stood out in front of the body of water where they just tossed their rock. She realized how intimate this position was, but her body did not allow her to move. She felt the urge to lean back on his body but she used all the force in her body to resist the powerful urge. She couldn't help but to noticed how well his hands fit over her hip bones, just like two pieces of a puzzle. She could feel his breath on the top of her head and it made her shiver ever so slightly and she knew that he could feel the subtle trembe in her body.

"We should go." She finally said. He didn't reply, but simply released his hands from her lips, and smiled. She smiled back, missing the feeling of contact. Beckett turned around to jog up the hill back towards the café.

"You think that maybe the parents and kids didn't really go through the adoption process?"

"There's a chance."

"I think we should look more into this so-called adoption. Who were the parents, what happenned to them…"

"Of Guillaume and Clemence?"

"Yah."

"The mother mentioned that their parents disappeared."

"But who where they? Maybe they knew our victim?" Beckett made sure to make a note to look into it as soon as they returned to work the next morning. Castle's insights were often very valuable. That was the benefit of having a novelist on your team, crime novelists had the unique ability to think like killers, especially if they were good writers.

The café was almost empty when the arrived. It was after all 10 PM at night, not really the time to be filling up on caffiene. The air conditioning was buzzing quietly in the corner and only a few of the purple and teal sparkly tables were occupied. The neon sign was flashing the word 'Bennet's" outside. A large cardboard cut out of a coffee cup adorned the corner right beside the trashcan and a table away from where Castle and Beckett were seated waiting for the arrival of the boy.

"Did you want anything?" Castle stood up to walk to the counter.

"What? Oh, no thank you." Beckett thought it was sweet that he thought of her. She glanced briefly at is backside as he sauntered over to the counter. She pressed her lips together to suppress a bubbling giggle and returned to focusing on the case file in her hands. She knew it was going to be a long night. She knew it was her job to solve the murder and not find the son, but she couldn't help feeling she wished the priority were location. Castle was right though, if they found the killers, they have a good chance of finding the child.

"Black Beard!" The counter called. Beckett knit her eyebrows together. She rolled her eyes, however, when she saw Castle approach the counter, his chest puffed out like a robin showing off his feathers about to sing a song.

"Black Beard?" she smirked when he returned to his seat.

"Argghh." He did his best pirate imitation and sat down across from her. His timing was just about perfect because when he came back the boy was just walking through the door. He searched the tables with his eyes and saw Beckett waving at him. He pulled up a shiny teal chair and sat down.

"Hi." He greeted. Castle noted the obvious thick French accent in his voice.

"Hi, Guillaume. Is that how you pronounce it?"

"Yah, it doesn't really matter." He waved off the pronunciation of his name.

"You said you had something to tell us?" Castle asked as Beckett pulled out her legal pad that she took notes on.

The boy nodded. "J'ai connu Marie, I knew Marie." He said. Switching from French to English.

"You knew her. How well?" The boy looked confused. Beckett repeated the question, but he didn't seem to understand her.

"Elle était ton ami…?" _Was she your friend?_ Castle struggled with his French a little bit, unable to find a better way to phrase the question.

"Pas mon ami." _Not my friend. _"Je n'ai pas bien connu." _I didn't know her well._

"He says that they weren't friends, he didn't know her well. " Castle translated and Kate scribbled down some notes with her pencil.

"How did you meet her."

"Quand nos parents' ont disapparu, ils y'avait deux personnes qui nous avons aide." _When our parents disappeared, there were two people who helped us. _"Ils nous ont donné leur numéro de téléphone. La femme a dit si nous n'aimons pas nos parents, ou nous voulions retourner, nous pourrons leur téléphoner. Alors, je lui ai telephoné, et elle a dit que Marie nous aiderait." They gave us their number_. The woman said that if we didn't like our parents or we wanted to come home we could call. So I called her and she said that Marie would help us._ Castle translated again.

"She said," Guillaume began again this time in English. "She said that Marie would take us to Pontalier and we would meet up with them. They said that they could be our parents. She said that we could go home and maybe one day we could all move back to Paris. All Clemence wanted to do was go back home. She said that she did not like it here. New York, Clemence said that she is dirty and that the kids at her school are mean. The woman said that they had different names of us, new passports in the EU." Guillaume explained in one breath of air and Beckett scribbled even faster onto her notepad.

"What happened, why didn't she take you? Is it because she was killed?"

"No. The lady called us, and she told us that Marie had decided she didn't want to go back to France."

"Do you know this ladies name?" Castle asked. Guillaume shook his head apologetically.

"Do you mind giving us your phone number? The phone you used to call the lady with." The boy nodded and scribbled some numbers on a napkin with a black sharpie.

"Well, thank you for letting us know." Beckett said.

"Don't tell my parents. We were going to run away. They couldn't know that." Castle looked at Beckett who nodded and said that she wouldn't say anything to them unless it was necessary. Guillaume thanked them, waved to the man at the counter and left without another word.

"That is one heck of a plan."

"Whoever this couple was that set this whole thing up was experienced. They've done this before." Beckett said.

"We have no clue who they are."

"I'll text Ryan and Esposito the trace the phone and see where that takes us. I know he's just a kid, but we'll have to investigate further. He'd be pretty angry at Marie for bailing out at the last minute; that's motive."

Castle nodded wordlessly and stood up to leave. "I'm going to grab a cab, want to ride with?" He offered.

"No thanks, Castle, I think I'm just going to head home and get some sleep."

Castle didn't bother arguing and turned in the other direction to hail a cab. When he got the attention of one, he opened the door and smiled once more, "until tomorrow." He smirked.

"Goodnight, Castle." She smiled. She hated that he could make her melt inside. She sighed, this time a sigh of sadness, sad to see him go and she flagged down a cab of her own to head home.

Kate Beckett arrived back at her apartment before midnight and fumbled around the wall to find the light switch. She groaned when the lights turned on and squinted, refusing to let her eyes adjust to the brightness. Sighing once more, she headed towards her bathroom to take a quick shower before going to sleep. As she walked, she remembered the feeling of Castle's hands on her body and his words about Paris.

She was always fond of him, but she thought she concealed it rather well. This case, however, was pushing the limits. She thought about what Agent Booth had said to Dr. Brennan about drawing the line. Castle had mentioned the line was not originally drawn between him and Dr. Brennan, but rather between him and Dr. Saroyan. She knew there was a professional line, but the line wasn't really helpful when you still had feelings for the other person.

"Stupid lines." She muttered.

"Dad!" Alexis exclaimed the moment Castle appeared through the doorway.

"Hey pumpkin, aren't you supposed to be in bed?" He asked her quizzically.

"It's summer." She defended herself and wrapped her arms around his waist.

"yes, the heat seems to bring out the best in us."

"How is the case?"

"Confusing."

"Are the Feds helping?"

"Yeah. Hey, Booth's squints invited you into the lab, by the way, so if tomorrow you want to head over to the lab with them, feel free to do so."

"Really?" she looked excited, she had heard of Dr. Brennan before and read all about her work. Castle nodded. Alexis now looked rather giddy and bounced back up to her room. "Well, now that gives me a reason to get a good nights sleep."

Castle grinned. "Goodnight." He blew her a kiss, and she caught it. "By the way, do you know where your grandma is?"

"Grams is at a party with some old friends. She left just before she came. She said not to worry about her."

"How could I not?" Castle smiled.

Alexis vanished into her room, leaving Castle standing alone in the dimly lit room pondering on a good excuse to give Beckett about his little slip on Paris. He decided that while he pondered he would watch some kind of cheesy late night show on television. His thoughts were interrupted he when the he heard a sharp knock the door. Castle wondered if his mother had forgotten the keys to their apartment again, she could be rather forgetful.

Castle opened the door and stood face to face with detective Beckett. "Hey." She said softly.

"Hey, it's almost one in the morning, what are you doing here?"

"I couldn't sleep, are you…sleeping? I didn't mean to wake you if you were. I should have called first, I'm sorry." Beckett stuttered around her words.

"Hey…I wasn't sleeping. Quit talking faster than the speed of light." He joked. Cautiously, he enveloped his arms around her. She stiffened at first, but then accepted the hug graciously, leaning on his shoulder. Her dark hair was sprawled out across his lightly colored shirt. His head rested perfectly on top of hers. She thought of puzzle pieces again.

When they pulled apart, they both stepped out into the hallway instead of his apartment. "What was that for?" she asked.

"I don't know. I thought maybe it would help me figure out an eloquent reason for tomorrow."

"Did it work?"

"No, not really."

"Hugs don't generally help make people more loquacious." She joked. "Listen, I was going to see if I could get into the lab and take a look at some of the stuff they have there, do you want to come?"

"Sure. How are we going to get into the lab though, there are special key cards."

"Damn, you're right." Castle smirked. There was no way she didn't know that. The phone rang as soon as Castle opened his mouth to come up with a solution to their problem.

"Beckett." Kate answered.

"_Detective, are you up?" _

"Yeah."

"_Bones and I were going to go back to the lab in a couple minutes. I couldn't sleep, so I figured we could head over and analyze some of the data." _

"Sounds good. We were just thinking of ways we could get a hold of that key card to get into the lab."

"_Perfect then. Did you want me to swing by and pick up Castle?"_

"No, I've got him right here with me. We'll just share a cab there."

"_Oh…oh. May I inquire as to what you two are doing together at one in the morning?"_ Booth was just like another Ryan or Esposito always trying to pry into their relationship.

"I told you, I came over to see if we could head over to the lab."

"_I'm sure that's it. Just to warn you. Dr. Parish and Angela had drinks tonight."_

"So?"

"_You told us that Dr. Parish is always trying to get you two together, well Angela is quite the match maker herself, so I'd just be careful to watch out for their plans."_ This time it was Bones who spoke.

"May I inquire as to why you and Dr. Brennan are together at one a.m. in the morning?" Castle laughed, returning Booth's comment at them. Him and Beckett high-fived quietly.

"_Bones and I share a room. Don't worry. She sleeps on her side, I sleep on mine."_

"Oh, so you share a bed too." Castle teased. "Shouldn't you two be watching out for some matchmaking plans?" He and Beckett both laughed.

"_Just meet us at the lab."_ Booth said and hung up. Beckett and Castle burst into fits of laughter before heading towards the elevator to go down to the lab in the middle of the night.

Beckett felt a little bit more jittery inside than usual due to tonight's events with Castle. She decided, however, that it was best to just push those feelings aside for now and concentrate on the case. In a kidnapping, every second counted. She just hoped that there were comfortable couches to sleep on in the lab, because she hadn't stalked up on enough caffeine to last the entire night.

"I've got a couple red bulls in my pocket in case we get tired." Castle said as they exited the building and headed towards the street to hail a cab for them.

Beckett looked at the blue and red drink and bit her lower lip, it was going to be a very long night.

End note: I know this chapter was caste/beckett heavy, the next will be booth/brennan heavy as well as some more moments with the four of them in the lab in the middle of the night pumped up on redbull. I'm sorry it took so long to update, I hope that the chapter was at least satsifying. I'm not really sure if I should apologize for the length, it wasn't supposed to be that long. I'll update as soon as I can. Thanks so much for reading and

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review!!!


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